Why People Can’t Be Answers

Day 29/365: We look for answers where we’ll never find them

Most of us search for answers in other people. Like the people around us are dictionaries, fortune tellers, or feelings detectors and experts in dealing with them. For my entire life, I’ve searched for answers in other people. I failed miserably to find any, and you probably failed as well because people can’t be answers.

Teachers

The first people you look up for answers are your teachers. While brilliant and well intended, most teachers only give you the answers that you don’t want. You couldn’t care less about Maths or Geography when young, yet they force that exact knowledge down your throat.

They don’t do that intentionally, just because that’s their jobs, although in your early years, you worry more about why things are the way they are, not what things are exactly. You do that for the rest of your days, to be honest.

Girlfriends

Out of all of my girlfriends, I was never able to get answers from them about obvious stuff, like why they sometimes behaved the way they did, why they seem to be unhappy and then happy an hour later and so on.

Ultimately, when looking to a person that you are intimate with for answers, like your girlfriend, you’ll never be able to fully understand that answer, even if you find it because the reality never seems to coincide with the answer given to you by that person. Which leads to confusion and fights, of course.

Parents

You may rely on your parents to give you some answers right now, even if you’re in your mid-twenties and should not. I know I sometimes do. Parents are really the only ones that offer you unconditional love, but that might be harmful sometimes.

Overprotecting parents are giving you the answers they want to hear, not necessarily the ones that you’re seeking. Take them in, but take them lightly and always with a grain of salt.

Friends

For advice, friends do a good job in giving it to you but only if they can relate it to something that’s happening to them and is similar to your situation. And because no one situation is even similar to the other, the answers are almost never what you want them to.

Looking for answers in your friends will lead you to falsely believe that what’s true for them will be true for you, and when reality hits you from behind and straight into the back of your neck, well… good luck with that!

Strangers/Idols

Looking for answers in strangers or idols is the worst. They don’t know you, so why do you even relate to them? Stars, actors, musicians, they all got where they are by chance and hard work, not by trying to figure it all out first. They knew squat!

You can’t find answers in their books or movies because they are not there, they are buried deep within the individual and they are surely not coming out into the world through a book or a Facebook status about money, fame and success.

People are not answers

They’re just more questions. You’ll never find answers in other people because guess what? People do the same things you do, searching for answers about themselves, the life that they live and everything related to them in other people. The truth is, we’ll never find those answers outside.

“People aren’t answers. They’re just more questions”

The answers are and have always been deep within ourselves. We need a thorough, honest and real introspection if we really want to seek out for the truth about ourselves. No teachers, parents, girlfriends, drink mates nor superstars will ever help us find the truth about us. It’s impossible.

It’s our choice if we really want to find the answers within, or look for them in places were we know we’ll never find them.

Thank you for your time!

My name is Gabriel Iosa, I’m a 25 years old travel enthusiast, food lover, Psychology student, Full-time Freelancer, writer and Instagram fanatic. You can follow me @gabrieliosa, and if you liked this post, give it exactly 47 claps!

I’m on a mission to write 365 articles in 2018. This is definitely the biggest writing challenge of my life so far. If you’d like to be part of the journey, please follow me here on Medium.com for the daily posts!